"Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
-- George Orwell, Politics and the English Language

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Thursday, March 05, 2015

Gangsta Wrap

Darren Wilson may or may not have gotten away with something, but Eric Holder deserves some credit for holding the Ferguson Police Department organizationally accountable for what it truly is -- a racist gang of shakedown artists. Facts and figures won't convert the faithful, but they don't lie, either.

The dirty little open secret is that this sort of systematic abuse goes on across the country. It always has, but civil asset forfeiture laws have incentivized the profit motive, the evisceration of the 4th Amendment has given law enforcement virtually unlimited power, and a post-9/11 subservience to cops has made them untouchable.

There's nothing I can add to what Ta-Nehisi Coates has to say about all this, just my disgust that public employees can soak the taxpayers while passing each other racist emails about the president, and then turn around and systematically harass, abuse, and steal from black citizens. Fire them all, preferably from a cannon.